Blogs from Los Lagos, Chile, South America - page 2

Landing in Osorno is a shock. Flying south from Santiago de Chile all you see from the Eastern side of the plane are volcanoes. They seemed to get larger and more frequent as we went on. Then we dropped down onto a huge rolling fertile plain, with small farms, green meadows, ripening wheat, rivers and lakes. Wait. This is Uruguay – or Austria. The town of Osorno with some 150,000 inhabitants reminds me a lot of Melo – the one time Fairless/Brown home in Northern Uruguay. It is an agricultural town, serving rich farms that stretch East to the hills and down to the coast. The motto of the town is Meat, Milk and Wood -- the main sources of livelihood for the past 150 years. This area was tightly held by the Mapuche Indians, who ... read more

We were told that Volcano Osorno, last errupted 1835 when Charles Darwin visited Chile. Noting, that no murmuring was going on below the surface, we took two chairlifts before a 4.5 hour round hike to touch the snow and drink from the run off from icicles, before the chairlifts decent to base camp and the zig zag drive back down the remaining steep slope. Very breathtaking views of the the massive Llanquihue lake below, the second largest lake in South America and the cordillera mountain tops competing with majestic Osorno and Volcano Calbuco also in view. There are two other volcanoes in this vicinity, Puntiagudo and Tronador. Though these were not in view od our angle. Fasinating flora and fauna in the area and volcanic dust and larva rock of so many colours, depending on how ... read more

This was our penultimate stop on the cruise and I was eager to see if the weather would clear to show us the views of volcanic mountains for which the region is reknowned. We did see the ones behind Puerto Montt as we sailed away but from a great distance. Only a couple of months before our trip there had been eruptions but we weren't planning to go that close. Plus there had been a severe earthquake on Chiloe Island. We had booked the full day tour that included a boat ride in the National Park around the other side of Mount Osorno to Puerto Varas (City of Roses) hoping for a close view but the clouds hardly cleared so we saw only the lower slopes. However, en route we saw the devastation caused by the ... read more

Welcome to Puerto Montt, Chile. The sea got pretty rough last night but about 3:30 we pulled into some more sheltered waters and it suddenly got nice and smooth. This morning we were anchored in calm waters about half a mile from shore. So anyone following us on the map can point further south from Valparaiso. Puerto Montt is 41°28′S, which is approximately the same line as Wellington NZ. In comparison to something in the Northern Hemisphere, it is roughly equivalent to Cleveland, Ohio. It was chillier today than the previous days, and was overcast all day long. We dressed in sweatshirt today for our excursion as the high was expected to only reach 60 degrees. Brrrrr. We went to the Horizon Court buffet breakfast and we were surprised that it wasn’t very crowded. It was ... read more

Nous arrivons sur l'île Chiloe avec le soleil, ce qui est rare car c'est l'endroit connu pour être le plus pluvieux du Chili! L'étape est incontournable pour nous puisque elle va nous permettre de prendre un ferry pour arriver en Patagonie! Voulant repartir rapidement, il n'y a plus de place et nous devons attendre le prochain bateau 6 jours après. De quoi avoir le temps d'explorer les moindres recoins de cette île..Nous passons quelques jours à Castro, c'est la ville principale qui est connue pour sa célèbre église jaune, la plus ancienne du pays! Wouahou! C'est une ville plutôt agréable, avec son marché où l'on peut déguster du bon poisson. Ici, c'est autant la cantine pour nous que pour les lions de mer qui attendent que les poissonniers jettent des carcasses dans la mer! Pour nous, ... read more